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The Onion buys Infowars

nytimes.com

51–60 of 1001 posts

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#51
Inside a lot of humor is some deep seated truth.

It's encouraging that an org based on humor / even a little truth here ultimately buys and will discard an empire of hateful lies.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#52
post #2

The announcement by America's Finest News Source: https://theonion.com/heres-why-i-decided-to-buy-infowars/ Alex Jones response: https://x.com/RealAlexJones/status/1857058831135645739

Seems like the article is really gleeful. Somewhat ironic since The Onion could be brought down in the same way by defamation lawsuits.

Not likely. Satire is protected under the First Amendment.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#53

Funny concept. Shame that The Onion's writing these days so mid.

I think the Onion is as good as it ever was. The issue now is that the real news is so wild and unhinged the Onion doesn't have that segment cornered anymore.

Oh come on now. The world wasn't just sent to live with it's auntie and uncle in Bel-Air. The distressed sullen worldview might be new to you, but people certainly had it back when I found the Onion regularly quite enjoyable too.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#55

I'm very much not a fan of Q-anon and related subcultures, but the sandy-hook award of $1.5 billion is obviously ridiculous, and is clearly just a government/institutional exercise in dictatorial/systemic power. There is no possible way that someone ranting on the internet can cause 1.5 billion of emotional damage or whatever the claim was. In particular, the libel (and it should be libel, making claims that are not…

The ends justify the means, in some circumstances. If you play fair against monsters, monsters win. > but the tools and methods used were entirely inappropriate to a liberal democracy, where you prevail with better arguments. I strongly disagree this is our operating environment, based on the evidence.

> If you play fair against monsters, monsters win.

If you become a monster to fight the monster, the monster always wins!

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#56
Inside a lot of humor is some deep seated truth.

It's encouraging that an org based on humor / even a little truth here ultimately buys and will discard an empire of hateful lies.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#57

The current speculation by the right-o-sphere that Alex Jones is about to be appointed the Trump press secretary is apt for the moment where Trump seems to have made his nominations on the basis of how much they will disturb the left. It's hard to imagine anyone that could be more effective at achieving that than Jones.

I don’t think effective government is founded on the basis of lolz.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#58

I'm very much not a fan of Q-anon and related subcultures, but the sandy-hook award of $1.5 billion is obviously ridiculous, and is clearly just a government/institutional exercise in dictatorial/systemic power. There is no possible way that someone ranting on the internet can cause 1.5 billion of emotional damage or whatever the claim was. In particular, the libel (and it should be libel, making claims that are not…

[flagged]

Such as?

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#60

The current speculation by the right-o-sphere that Alex Jones is about to be appointed the Trump press secretary is apt for the moment where Trump seems to have made his nominations on the basis of how much they will disturb the left. It's hard to imagine anyone that could be more effective at achieving that than Jones.

> It's hard to imagine anyone that could be more effective at achieving that than Jones.

Asking as a non-American: how disturbing would it be if he appointed Putin?

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